And on the following day he did not go before two o'clock. The
consequence was, that poor Miss Baker and her niece were kept at home
in a state of miserable suspense. To them his visit was quite as
important as to himself; and by one of them, the elder namely, it was
regarded with an anxiety quite as nervous.

When he did call, he was received with all the hospitality due to an
old friend. "Why had he not come to tea the night before? Tea had
been kept for him till eleven o'clock. Why, at any rate, had he not
come to breakfast? He had been much nicer in Jerusalem," Miss Baker
said.

Bertram answered hardly with the spirit which had marked all that he
had said in that far-away land. "He had been afraid to disturb them
so late; and had been unwilling to intrude so early." Miss Waddington
looked up at him from the collar she was working, and began to ask
herself whether she really did like him so much.

"Of course you will dine with us," said Miss Baker. George said he
would, but assured her that he had not intended to give so much
trouble. Could this be the same man, thought Caroline, who had
snubbed Mr. M'Gabbery, and had stood by laughing when she slipped
into the water?

All manner of questions were then asked and answered respecting their
different journeys. Constantinople was described on one side, and
the Tyrol; and on the other the perils of the ride to Jaffa, the
discomforts of the Austrian boat to Alexandria, and the manners
of the ladies from India with whom Miss Baker and her niece had
travelled in their passage from Egypt to Marseilles. Then they said
something about uncle George--not that Miss Baker so called him--and
Bertram said that he had learnt that Miss Baker had been staying at
Hadley.

"Yes," said she; "when I am in town, I have always money matters
to arrange with Mr. Bertram, or rather to have arranged by Mr.
Pritchett; and I usually stay a day or two at Hadley. On this
occasion I was there a week."

George could not but think that up to the period of their meeting at
Jerusalem, Miss Baker had been instructed to be silent about Hadley,
but that she was now permitted to speak out openly.

And so they sat and talked for an hour. Caroline had given her
aunt strict injunctions not to go out of the room, so as to leave
them together during Bertram's first visit. "Of course it would be
palpable that you did so for a purpose," said Caroline.

"And why not?" said Miss Baker, innocently.

"Ne